His Brand of Beautiful

by Lily Malone

  A thick-set blonde woman in a white pants-suit was lifting the lid of a big green portable recycling bin. When she saw him, she gave a strangled cry and her beer bottle clattered into the nest of glass. The lid crashed with a hollow bang.

  “Whoa. Sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.” Tate held both hands up.

  The blonde put her hand to her chest, breathing hard. “Shit-a‐brick, buddy. I thought you were coming at me with a rock. I thought I was about to get mugged.”

  “Are you okay, Pen?” A reed of a woman with big hair appeared around the back of an old Toyota, she held a wineglass in one hand and shielded her eyes with the other, squinting hard.

  “I’m here, Cath. This guy nearly gave me a heart attack.”

  “But you’re okay? You’re not hurt?”

  Tate tried to edge around pants-suit Pen.

  The woman called Cath took another few steps down the length of the Toyota and Tate sensed her grip on the wineglass tighten. She wore a pants suit too, only hers was a shade of purple so deep in the dark, it was nearer black, and the pants were flared, like she had dinner plates around each ankle.

  The penny clicked. “Hey great costumes, ladies. ABBA right? I voted Mamma Mia in my Top 20. Love that song. Have they played it yet?”

  Pen’s white-knuckled grip on the glass relaxed and Tate breathed a sigh of relief.

  Crisis averted. You had to love ABBA fans.

  ****

  Christina’s hat slipped as Bram turned her under his arm. It slipped again and she jerked it off and tossed it at the bonnet of the nearest car. It landed on the sand like a fluffy brown rat, near the dark tangle of tree-trunk guy’s black jacket.

  It was hot, jiving in her heavy coat, but she was having fun. Her hair whipped her face and the exercise had her blood pumping.

  Old Time Rock And Roll faded. The opening bars of the next song drew a collective groan from the dance floor, until a wave of ABBA fans flooded into the lights; Sally Jeffries and her friend amongst them. Agnetha. Frida.

  “That’s it, Bram, ABBA’s where I draw the line,” Christina said.

  “Let’s wait for the next one.”

  She could feel the spread of sweat where his thumb gripped her palm. “One more.

  That’s all, Bram. And if the next song’s no good, that’s it. Okay?”

  “Okay.” He led her towards the spot where tree-trunk guy stood, just outside the circle of lights, leaning against the bonnet of a car. His arms were crossed in front of his chest and his eyes roved the crowd.

  His lips moved.

  “Do you have other security up here?” She asked Bram.

  “No. Why?”

  “Your thug is talking to someone.”

  Bram had positioned himself to face the dance floor. Now he took a quick peek over his shoulder.

  Tree-trunk guy’s toe tapped and suddenly, Christina laughed. “He’s not talking. He’s singing. Your big tough hunk of teak is singing Mamma Mia!”

  Bram snickered, turned back to the dance floor, and froze. “Jesus Christ.”

  “What?” Christina turned to follow his eyes and had to shield her own against the spotlight glare. Not that it mattered. She’d know that silhouette, anywhere. Her mind cried out, Tate, and her heart swapped places with her shoes. There was something clutched in the palm of his hand. A screwed-up chunk of… what?

  Bram took a half-step back, right arm pinwheeling to get his bodyguard’s attention.

  “Ian? Ian! He’s got a rock.”

  Droplets of Bram’s spit spun through the lights, Christina felt one rain on her cheek.

  She twisted back to the security guard, praying he didn’t carry a gun.

  Tree-trunk guy hadn’t moved, but he had stopped singing. His expression was somehow puzzled, like there was a maths equation in his head he couldn’t add-up.

  Tate had a rock? Why? Christina didn’t believe it. Dancers spun in front of them, blocking her view.

  Out the corner of his mouth, Bram hissed: “Ian?”

  Christina stepped sideways, spreading her arms like wings with Bram at the centre of her back. The dancers before her cleared, and she saw Tate raise his hand.

  She had time to scream: “Bram, it’s not a r—”

  Then Tate cannoned sideways, broadsided by the battering ram of a massive hip and shoulder. The lump in Tate’s hand dislodged and unravelled, and it was still rolling, drunkenly as Tate ploughed to a stop.

  The music died.

  A sound Christina hadn’t heard herself make in thirty-five years squeaked from her lips when Tate hit the ground. She lunged forward, only to be snapped back by Bram.

  “Let Ian do his job, CC. It’s what I pay him for.”

  Christina pointed at the sand-covered fabric, now covered in sand. “Jesus, Bram.

  Does that look like a bloody rock to you?”

  Tate rubbed the back of his neck. Tree-trunk guy loomed over him, and for a long second they stood like that, frozen in time—victor and vanquished—like a battlefield sculpture.

  Lily Malone

  “Well look what crawled out from under its rock,” Tate said, when he could speak.

  Then he looked at Bram: “Are my taxes paying for you to employ rogue cops now, Shadow Minister?”

  “Rogue cops?” Bram muttered. “Ian? What’s he talking about?”

  Ian? And for Christina, the penny dropped. This was Ian Callinan?

  “Well, fuck me, hey?” Callinan said, his voice a bull’s rumble inside that massive chest. “If I knew it was you, Tate, you wouldn’t be sittin’ up this week.”

  “I’m gonna stand up right now and we’ll see how that goes.” Tate pushed one hand into the sand and stood, keeping his movements slow and easy. “I’m unarmed and there’s a helluva lot of witnesses here, Ian, but that never worried you before, did it?”

  The veins in Callinan’s neck bulged. “Give me fifty cents and I’ll call someone who cares.”

  “Do you know what type of rabid dog you’ve let off the leash here, Shadow Minister?” Tate said, loud enough for the crowd to hear. “Your guy almost killed a kid over a stolen packet of biscuits up in Queensland a few years back. He’s kicked an Aboriginal stockman so hard he turned his insides into soup. That’s when they kicked him off the Force.”

  “My guy?” Bram said. “I hired him as a favour for a friend… a friend of a friend.”

  Christina could almost hear the political cogs rotating in Bram’s head.

  “You always had a big mouth, Tate. It’ll be fun to shut it for you,” Callinan said. The slabs of muscle in his back clenched and he exploded forward like a grizzly bear. Christina felt the vibrations beneath her boots.

  Tate sidestepped and Callinan clutched thin air.

  The ex-cop turned, shook his head once to clear it, spat on his hands and rubbed them together. He stalked forward on the balls of his feet, and if he’d been playing before, now he was deadly serious. Two metres from Tate, he rushed again.

  But Tate was cobra-quick. He feinted right, dodged left, and caught Callinan across the back of that big bull head. He used the guard’s wild momentum to force him down hard, at the same time as he knifed a knee up into the bigger man’s gut. Air exploded from Callinan’s lungs and he sprawled face-first to the ground.

  “You got off light when they took your badge, arsehole. If it had been me I’d have thrown away the key.”

  Then Tate stood, straight and proud, wiped his hands on his jeans, and stepped away from the man on the sand who rolled to his side, fighting for air.

  Christina felt Tate search for her. She stumbled forward, tripping through the sand.

  Then his arms wrapped her into his chest and she never wanted to leave.

  “It’s all right, baby, it’s all right. Don’t be scared. It’s all over,” he crooned into her hair, over and over, breathing hard.

  Even now her heart jackhammered, long after her brain told her danger had passed.

  “My God. My God. I thought he was go
ing to kill you.” Her whole body shuddered and she pulled away to look him over, her hands fluttering down his sides, patting at his hips, his shoulders, his face. “Did he hurt you?”

  “I’m fine.”

  Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the security guard crawl from the circle of light, toward his jacket and the cars, like some huge broken spider seeking comfort in darkness.

  Bram appeared behind her. “Seriously, Tate. I’m very sorry about all that. We had an incident a few months ago, you might remember? When the Premier was attacked? All our security guys are a bit toey at the moment.”

  “Tate, CC, look out!” That was Lacy’s voice, raised in a scream.

  And then everything happened too fast.

  Christina tried to turn, tried to see what was happening… but Tate’s hold on her was tight and he was turning too, only he sought the threat in the opposite direction, and she couldn’t see… couldn’t, until her head cleared his shoulder and her heart started its roller-coaster ride again.

  The security guard was on his feet, something block-shaped coming up in his hand.

  The voice in her head screamed gun. But it didn’t look right. Not like any gun she’d seen.

  His thick arm, came up, up. Level.

  Tate’s yell, deafening: “You idiot, she’s—”

  And Bram’s roar: “Shoot that you dickhead and you are so fired—”

  And a high-pitched ticking in her ears, like the fastest clock in the world.

  A woman’s scream. Not hers. At least, Christina didn’t think so. She smelled Old Spice and heard a man’s groan, cut-off horribly.

  And everything went quiet.

  Darkness.

  Everywhere.

  Lily Malone

  Chapter 27

  Christina woke staring into the eyes of a stranger. His fingers were on her face, smooth and probing. A bright and persistent light stabbed at the back of her eye and she tried to bat it away.

  “She’s okay. Mr Lewis caught most of the shock. Give her time.”

  “The baby?” Tate’s voice.

  “I’m sure they’ll both be fine.” That was the stranger again. The man with the light.

  “She needs rest tonight and maybe a stop at the Maree nursing station for a check-up on the way home tomorrow. She’s been lucky. She can have Panadol if she wakes up and wants it but nothing stronger.”

  And the voices and the lights left her alone.

  ****

  Next time Christina woke, she was in their tent. Tate lay by her side, an arm over his eyes.

  She thought he was asleep until his hand clenched into a fist. A lantern on low hissed soft white light, filling the space with the faint smell of gas. She couldn’t hear music but there were voices outside. Some clear and close. Others distant. She had no idea what time it was, or how long she’d been out of it.

  “We sure know how to wreck a party hey?” Her lips were dry, the sound barely more than a croak.

  Tate was on his elbow in a flash. “Are you okay, sweetheart? Does it hurt?”

  “I’m okay.” Her throat felt like the desert floor. “Is there any water?”

  “Here.”

  He gave her a half-litre plastic bottle and helped her sit. She felt better once she’d glugged a few mouthfuls.

  “What happened?”

  “What do you remember?”

  “I remember… Ian Callinan is here. There was a fight. I thought he had a gun.” She struggled to sit. “Is the baby okay?”

  He stopped her. “The baby’s fine, sweetheart. Sshh. It’s okay. It wasn’t a gun. He had a taser. He was aiming at me.” Tate’s voice turned hard and flat. “I walked you into the firing line and I didn’t even know. Bram Lewis jumped in front of you. In front of both of us. He took the shock. There’s a retired doctor on the Bash who examined you. He thinks Bram might have had hold of your arm when the taser barb hit, possibly. Or otherwise you plain fainted.”

  “I don’t go around fainting at the drop of a hat.”

  “It was hardly the drop of a hat, Christina.” But his lips curved into a hint of a smile.

  “Is Bram okay?”

  “He’s sore. You’d expect that.”

  She wanted to keep Tate talking. She wanted to ease the pain she could see written all over his face. “You’re blaming yourself.”

  He picked up her hand, skin rough and warm around her own. A lock of tawny hair fell over his eye and he flicked it away.

  “Tate—”

  “No. Me first.” He put his finger on her lips. “I told you I’d never forgive you if you came on this race and you let something happen to our baby. I said I’d never forgive you or myself as long as I breathed.”

  “But it’s not your fault—”

  “If that worthless piece of shit had hurt you or the baby. My God, Christina. I would have killed him.”

  Chill gripped every cell. “Where is he now? Callinan.”

  Tate’s smile was broader this time. “Relax. I didn’t hurt him.”

  Thank God.

  “He’s locked in a room at the back of the pub. Denton and Michael and Tom and I don’t know how many others it took to hold him.”

  “What happens now?”

  “Maree cops will come for him in the morning. He’ll have charges to answer.” He jerked his chin sideways. “The lawyers can figure it out. I don’t care.”

  She couldn’t stop the slow trickle of tears. They slid from beneath eyelids that felt heavy as lead.

  “I just want to be with you, Christina, wherever you are. Everything I’ve tried to do…anything I’ve tried to get you to do, I’ve fucked it up. So I won’t push. I love you.”

  She squeezed his hand. The heat of his skin against her palm was the last thing she knew.

  I love you, too.

  “I know,” he said. Only it was like a whisper from a dream. And all she could remember later was a sense that whatever she’d said; it made Tate happy.

  ****

  “I owe you,” Tate said to Abraham Lewis next morning as they watched the Channel 10 helicopter hover, then settle, on the spot where the Birdsville Track widened to make the turn-off to the Mungeranie Pub.

  “We all do,” Michael added.

  The sandy-haired politician laughed like it was no big deal, like he went around leaping in front of security guards wielding tasers every other day. “I never did mind storing up the favours, Tate. Especially with PR people. Who knows when I might need crisis management, hey?”

  “Well, it won’t be today. Today you get to be hero,” Tate said.

  “If that meathead gorilla I was dumb enough to hire had hurt either one of you, I couldn’t buy another vote for the rest of my life. A run-in with a taser is a small price to pay.

  Hell, our party leader did it just to find out what it felt like and she’s a woman, right?”

  Out on the road, the helicopter blades quieted and a blonde reporter waved as she climbed out the chopper. She looked left and right as if she expected a motorcade, then ran with fierce strides toward them, notebook clutched in her hand.

  Tate welcomed her once she was close enough to hear. “Jenni Gray. Good to see you.”

  “You too, Tate.” They shook hands.

  The reporter smiled at Bram, showing a set of perfect-for‐television teeth. “Shadow Minister. Nice to see you again. Congratulations. I hear you’re the man of the hour.”

  Lily Malone

  “You can still give Christina a ride back to Adelaide in the chopper?” Tate asked, before she got sidetracked by her story.

  “Yeah, we’ve got room,” Jenni said. “We’ll get a shot of the chopper delivering her to the hospital so the station looks good too. Royal Flying Doctor Service here we come.”

  “CC won’t like it,” Michael said to Tate.

  “She’ll do it for the baby—”

  Jenni Gray interrupted, addressing the politician. “You saved a lady with a baby?”

  “Apparently, yes,” Bram looked po
intedly at Michael. “I was just last to know.”

  “Okay then.” The reporter turned business-like. “Let’s go see what my colleagues caught on tape.”

  “We could always re-enact it if they missed the good bit,” Bram offered.

  Tate had to resist the urge to ram the notebook down both their throats.

  Chapter 28

  Eva-Jolie Newell tried to eat her tiny fist. Her mouth made sucking sounds as she butted her head against Saffah’s neck.

  “That’s a dry argument, kid,” Saffah laughed, trying to distract the three-month‐old infant with the chime of Haitian beads about her neck. It worked. The baby bashed at the clanking wood and forgot her stomach for a time.

  They were in the lounge-room of Richard and Saffah’s house—the big house—

  Christina had always thought of it. She sat perched at the front of the couch, jouncing her boots on the carpet. Her father stood because he’d given up any pretense of trying to sit still. He stared out the bay window.

  Usually that would offer him a peaceful view of the vineyard—vines colouring this time of year into bright reds and soft golds. Today, that view was dominated by a chunky white truck and the comings and goings of three removalist men ferrying cardboard boxes to the verandah. Tate was out there somewhere too, directing traffic.

  Tate’s Elizabeth Avenue house was sold. The celebratory champagne was in Saffah’s fridge. Breastfeeding or not, Christina was determined to have herself a glass.

  They had two weeks before they could move into Tate’s new house on California Road, a 1910 stone cottage much like the one at Three Oaks Lane, only instead of brick paths and an overgrown camellia bush, this cottage was surrounded by two hectares of vines. When they moved in, Christina would be five minutes from Clay Wines, but for the next two weeks, the big house was home.

  “They must be getting close to finished now,” Richard said, watching his view being eaten away by a small city of beige boxes.

  “Are we ready to do this, Saff?” Christina asked, feeling her pulse flip.

  “I’m ready if you are.” Saffah let the baby kick the air.

  “Let’s do it,” Christina said. “Before Tate comes in and wrecks the surprise.”